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Ties That Bind: Alliances for the Twenty-first Century

"Ties That Bind: Alliances for the Twenty-first Century" tackles the contexts, challenges, and outlooks for the United States' alliances around the world. Andrew Shearer, director of the Alliances and American Leadership Project and former national security advisor of Australia, gathers regional experts and former government officials from around the world to discuss the growth and modernization of these vital partnerships.

Podcast Episodes

Ties That Bind, Episode 5 - Alignment and Realignment

January 30, 2018

In this fifth episode, Andrew Shearer sits down with Gabriel Scheinmann, Executive Director of the Alexander Hamilton Society to discuss the concept of alignment and what United States’ policymakers can learn today from previous efforts by great power competition to peel off American Allies. Topics include the role of US leadership in maintaining strong alliances; what history can teach us about great power competition, alignment and alliances; and how the United States should respond to efforts by Russia, China and Iran to influence the alignment of regional countries and undermine US alliances.

Ties That Bind, Episode 4 – Partners for the Future Fight

January 23, 2018

In this fourth episode, Andrew Shearer sits down with Heidi Grant, the Deputy Under Secretary of the Air Force, International Affairs, to talk about why mutual alliances and partnerships matter to the United States Air Force. Topics include the role that allies will play in the future USAF; impediments to greater allied cooperation; prospects for future joint capability development on projects like the F-35; and the challenges of managing long-term international partnerships in an era of budget constraints.

Ties That Bind, Episode 3 – Beyond Transactional Alliances

January 22, 2018

In this third episode, Andrew Shearer sits down with Thomas Wright, director of the Center on the United States and Europe and senior fellow in the Project on International Order and Strategy at the Brookings Institute to talk about the role of alliances in upholding international order. Topics include the historical role of the United States’ alliances in Europe and Asia; the place of alliances in the United States’ domestic politics; the factors which have promoted the longevity of these alliances; and their future prospects.

Ties That Bind, Episode 2: Trump and U.S. Allies in Asia

February 9, 2017

In this second episode, Andrew Shearer sits down with Michael J. Green, senior vice president for Asia and Japan Chair, and Amy Searight, senior adviser and director, Southeast Asia Program, to talk about U.S. alliances in Asia. Topics include the history of American grand strategy in Asia; the prospects for the Obama-era rebalance to Asia under President Trump; the Japan, South Korea, Philippines, and Thailand alliances in a new era; Chinese coercion in East Asia and its effect on U.S. alliances; potential “allies of tomorrow;” and the conflict between security interests and economic interests for many of China’s neighbors.

Ties That Bind, Episode 1: NATO in the Trump Era

February 3, 2017

In this first episode of “Ties that Bind,” Andrew Shearer sits down with Heather Conley, CSIS senior vice president for Europe, Eurasia, and the Arctic, and director, Europe Program, to talk about all things NATO. The discussion covers the argument over the value of NATO, its costs, and conflation of the two; NATO’s role in a historical context and in 2017; the altered landscape of NATO’s adversaries, in particular the threat from Moscow, then and now; and an assessment of whether the framework of the organization is adequate to meet the needs of the 21st century.